Cross-screen measurement accuracy in advertising performance

ABSTRACT

The present invention is directed to statistical methods for measuring cross-screen efficacy as it relates to advertising. The improved statistical methods provide the ability for advertisers and advertising agencies to predict the behaviors of consumers based on their aggregated cross-screen behavior. The system creates a new output that includes optimized user segments and classifications. A second part of the output is improved measurement and prediction of future consumer behaviors based on the processed multi-sided data on cross-screen behavior.

CLAIM OF PRIORITY

This application claims the benefit of priority under 35 U.S.C. § 119(e)to U.S. provisional application Ser. No. 62/196,898, filed Jul. 24,2015, which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is related to U.S. patent application Ser. No.15/219,259, filed Jul. 25, 2016, entitled “TARGETING TV ADVERTISINGSLOTS BASED ON CONSUMER ONLINE BEHAVIOR”, Ser. No. 15/219,262, filedJul. 25, 2016, entitled “CROSS-SCREEN OPTIMIZATION OF ADVERTISINGPLACEMENT”, Ser. No. 15/219,264, filed Jul. 25, 2016, entitled“SEQUENTIAL DELIVERY OF ADVERTISING CONTENT ACROSS MEDIA DEVICES”, andto provisional application Ser. Nos. 62/196,637, filed Jul. 24, 2015,62/196,618, filed Jul. 24, 2015, 62/196,592, filed Jul. 24, 2015,62/196,560, filed Jul. 24, 2015, 62/264,764, filed Dec. 8, 2015,62/278,888, filed Jan. 14, 2016, 62/290,387, filed Feb. 2, 2016, and62/317,440, filed Apr. 2, 2016, all of which are incorporated herein byreference in their entireties.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The technology described herein generally relates to statistical methodsfor cross-screen intelligence as it relates to advertising. Thestatistical methods enable advertisers and advertising agencies topredict the behaviors of consumers based on their aggregatedcross-screen behavior. The methods integrate consumer data from avariety of media-enabled devices.

BACKGROUND

Today, predicting the behavior of consumers with available statisticalmethods is ineffective. This is in part because, siloed, device-specificapproaches are currently being utilized by advertisers and advertisingagencies. These methods limit the information available at theindividual consumer level for lack of an ability to track how consumersbehave across all of their media devices. For example, advertisersreceive data from TV panel companies such as Nielsen, and use theinformation to decide how they are going to design and implement anadvertising campaign. Panel companies utilize a small group of (usually15,000-20,000) people selected statistically to be representative of thepopulation, and use statistical extrapolation from viewing data on thepanel to make deductions about the population at large. Alternatively,the advertisers will receive data from online panels such as Comscore,Nielsen, and Kantar, which track where the audience is online. Cable TVoperators sell their own viewership data from their subscribers. Theadvent of online technology has meant that it is possible to directlycollect data on large numbers of consumers, with the potential toachieve to more accurate assessment of population viewing habits.Nevertheless, it has not been possible so far to design a singleadvertising campaign that addresses all of the different types of mediaat once because of the silo'ed nature of the data, and interface pointsto the various media conduits.

Thus, a direct, automated, aggregate view of consumer behavior does notcurrently exist today. Instead, advertisers and brand managers look ateach data source separately. Human analysts guide the selection ofadvertising inventory based on, for example, Excel data tables and otherstatic data management tools. This results in low selection efficiencyand delays in responding to market trends. Consumers are not disparatesilos of preference, yet the market for advertising treats them as suchdue to limitations in the available methods, most of which are incapableof quickly and accurately integrating information about how consumersbehave across all of their devices.

Strategy for TV is planned according to TV-specific criteria, and weband mobile advertising, which include sub categories such as socialmedia, are each planned separately. It is difficult to accuratelypredict consumer behavior, when data about their behavior is fragmenteddue to their multi-screen usage. Furthermore, consumers now have a largerange of possible behaviors. One consumer might favor using a set topbox to watch sports, but may prefer using a mobile device to watchYouTube. Another consumer may favor Hulu access via their desktopcomputer, but only accesses social media via their smart phone. There isno practical method for normalizing a complete view of consumer data topredict how and when they will access certain media devices throughoutthe day.

These complications have ramifications for advertisers in their effortsto both design effective campaigns and assess—quantitatively—theeffectiveness of an ongoing campaign effort. The problem is especiallyacute for branding purposes, when it's more difficult for an advertiserto be confident that the right target audience saw a particularadvertisement, or that the advertisement reached as many people in thetarget audience as had been intended.

There are other aspects that advertisers would like to know that cannotbe reliably calculated today. For example, it is not possible to tellfrom Nielsen data whether the same consumer saw an advertisement on bothTV and mobile. A panel company has to extrapolate and can onlyimperfectly estimate an answer to this question, if at all. Furthermore,panel companies simply report data and trends in data, but typicallyhold back from making a recommendation to an advertiser to tailor ortarget its advertising content differently.

The discussion of the background herein is included to explain thecontext of the technology. This is not to be taken as an admission thatany of the material referred to was published, known, or part of thecommon general knowledge as at the priority date of any of the claimsfound appended hereto.

Throughout the description and claims of the application the word“comprise” and variations thereof, such as “comprising” and “comprises”,is not intended to exclude other additives, components, integers orsteps.

SUMMARY

The instant disclosure addresses the processing of consumer andadvertising inventory in connection with assessing optimal placement ofadvertising content across display devices. In particular, thedisclosure comprises methods for doing the same, carried out by acomputer or network of computers. The disclosure further comprises acomputing apparatus for performing the methods, and computer readablemedia having instructions for the same. The apparatus and process of thepresent disclosure are particularly applicable to video content inonline and TV media.

The methods herein can be achieved in part by detecting whether aconsumer saw the same advertisement on more than one device, i.e.,getting a measure of deduplicated reach. The system herein can retrievedata from lots of sources, and can do a better job of extrapolation toother consumers and to other media for the same consumers because it canwork with attributes from a population of users. Thus, the system canextrapolate based on census data, segments, etc., based on consumer anddevice graph properties.

Accordingly, basic quantities such as GRP and TRP (currently estimatedby panel companies such as Nielsen) can be calculated more reliably. Itis also possible to go beyond those basic parameters, and obtainadditional types of information, which can be used in refinements of anadvertising strategy.

For example, if it can be calculated how many times the same consumerhas seen an advertisement, then an advertiser can adjust parameters ofits campaign so that at the next iteration of the campaign, it is moreeffective at eliminating redundancy in the message. Parameters that canbe changed include, but are not limited to: demographics of the audiencemembers; inventory (TV spot, online website); time of day, region, andnetwork. For example, it might be deduced from measurement that, e.g., aparticular channel is not effective. The measurements can also be usedto ensure frequency capping.

The system can calculate one or more of: optimized consumer segments(i.e., a segment of consumers that performs better, according to, forexample, branding or direct response; classifications; and improvedmeasurement and prediction of future consumer behaviors based on theprocessed data on cross-screen behavior.

The present disclosure provides for a method for quantifying efficacy ofan advertising campaign, comprising: identifying a target audience basedon one or more demographic factors; for a consumer in the targetaudience, identifying two or more display devices accessible to theconsumer, wherein the two or more display devices comprise at least oneTV and at least one mobile device, and wherein the identifying utilizesa device graph constructed from an aggregation of TV viewing data andonline behavioral data for the consumer; monitoring delivery of two ormore items of advertising content to the consumers in the targetaudience, wherein the two or more items of advertising content comprisevideo content and are scheduled for delivery on the two or more devices;receiving a confirmation of whether each of the consumers viewed each ofthe first and second items of advertising content; and utilizing theconfirmation in calculation of a deduplicated reach for the advertisingcampaign.

The present disclosure further provides for a method of reducingredundancy of delivery of advertising content, comprising: identifying atarget audience based on one or more demographic factors, wherein thetarget audience comprises consumers to whom an advertising campaign isdirected; for a consumer in the target audience, identifying two or moredisplay devices accessible to the consumer, wherein the two or moredisplay devices comprise at least one TV and at least one mobile device,and wherein the identifying utilizes a device graph constructed from anaggregation of TV viewing data and online behavioral data for theconsumer; monitoring delivery of two or more items of advertisingcontent to the consumers in the target audience, wherein the two or moreitems of advertising content comprise video content and are scheduledfor delivery on the two or more devices; receiving a confirmation ofwhether each of the consumers viewed each of the first and second itemsof advertising content; and if a consumer viewed both the first andsecond items of advertising content, adjusting one or more parameters ofthe advertising campaign, in order to reduce redundancy of delivery ofadvertising content to one or more of the consumers during subsequenttrials of the campaign, wherein the parameters are selected from one ormore of: demographic factors of the target audience; sources ofadvertising inventory; time of day of delivery; and region of delivery.

The present disclosure further includes a process for computer readablemedia, encoded with instructions for carrying out methods describedherein and for processing by one or more suitably configured computerprocessors.

The present disclosure additionally includes a computing apparatusconfigured to execute instructions, such as stored on a computerreadable medium, for carrying out methods described herein.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 shows, diagrammatically, relationships between parties thatcontribute to delivery of advertising content, such as advertisers, anadvertising exchange, media conduits, and consumers;

FIG. 2 shows a consumer graph.

FIG. 3 shows a node in a graph.

FIGS. 4A and 4B show steps in creation of a consumer graph.

FIG. 5 shows a sample consumer population.

FIG. 6 shows an apparatus for performing a process as described herein;

Like reference symbols in the various drawings indicate like elements.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The instant technology is directed to measurement of aspects of efficacyof a cross-screen advertising campaign. Cross-screen refers to mediadevice data that combines viewer data across multiple devices.

Types of Available Data and Resources

Data for use with the methods herein comes from a number of disparatesources, some of which directly from the consumer, and some itself basedon models.

TV Panels: Panelists are paid for providing information. Panels aremetered via remote while viewers watch content. Other information can besurveyed regarding products purchased, owned, preferences, etc.,(Nielsen/Kantar are examples). Nevertheless, despite attempts to makepanels representative of the population at large, most censusmeasurements are specific to the panel and/or the media outlet inquestion.

Online panels are managed by systems that track where an audience isonline and how consumers behave online. Panelists generally agree to betracked via a browser-based system with tool bar. Products use cookiesand pixels to track clicks, time spent on websites, sites visited, andonline purchases. (Comscore, Nielsen, and Kantar are examples ofcompanies that collect this type of data and analyze it.)

Cable operators provide TV viewing data, sometimes called meta-data, toSet Top Box data collectors: this allows use of data measured on actualviewing by subscribers to cable and satellite systems. The cableoperators sell this data to advertisers to assist with targetedadvertising campaigns.

Data can also be licensed directly from the cable operators or TV OEMs(such as Samsung, LG, etc.). The TV's have reporting chips that canreport back viewing data via the Internet to subscribers of that data,such as Rentrak, Fourthwall, and Samba.

Advertising Functions

Relationships between entities in the business of purchase, delivery andconsumption of advertising content are depicted in FIG. 1. As can beseen, the advertising ecosystem is complex, involves many differententities, and many different relationships.

An advertiser 101 is a purchaser of advertising inventory 109. Anadvertiser may be a corporation that exercises direct control over itsadvertising functions, or it may be an agency that manages advertisingrequirements of one or more clients, usually corporate entities. Theadvertiser intends to make advertising content 103 (also an“advertisement” herein) available to one or more, typically a populationof, consumers 105, on one or more devices 107 per consumer.

Devices 107 include, for a given consumer, one or more of: TV's(including SmartTV's), mobile devices (cell phones, smartphones, mediaplayers, tablets, notebook computers, laptop computers, and wearables),desktop computers, networked photo frames, set top boxes, gamingconsoles, streaming devices, and devices considered to function withinthe “Internet of Things” such as domestic appliances (fridges, etc.),and other networked in-home monitoring devices such as thermostats andalarm systems.

The advertising content 103 has typically been created by the advertiser101 or a third party with whom the advertiser has contracted, andnormally includes video, audio, and/or still images that seek to promotesales or consumer awareness of a particular product or service.Advertising content 103 is typically delivered to consumers via one ormore intermediary parties, as further described herein.

Advertising content is typically of two different types: branding, anddirect-response marketing. The timeframe is different for these twotypes. Branding promotes awareness; direct response marketing isdesigned to generate an immediate response. For example, an automobilemanufacturer may put out direct response marketing material into themarket place, and wants to measure responses by who went to a dealershipor website after seeing an advertisement. The methods herein can beapplied to both types of advertising content, but the measurement ofeffectiveness is different for the two types: for example, effectivenessof branding is measured by GRP's, and results of direct responsemarketing can be measured by, for example, website visits.

When delivered to a mobile device such as a phone or a tablet,advertising content 103 may additionally or alternatively take the formof a text/SMS message, an e-mail, or a notification such as an alert, abanner, or a badge. When delivered to a desktop computer or a laptopcomputer or a tablet, the advertising content 103 may display as apop-up within an app or a browser window, or may be a video designed tobe played while other requested video content is downloading orbuffering.

Consumers 105 are viewers and potential viewers of the advertisingcontent 103 and may have previously purchased the product or servicethat is being advertised, and may—advantageously to the advertiser—belearning of the product or service for the first time when they view theadvertising content 103.

Advertising inventory 109 (also inventory or available inventory,herein) comprises available slots, or time slots 117, for advertisingacross the several media interfaces, or conduits 111, through whichconsumers access information and advertising content. Such mediainterfaces include TV, radio, social media (for example, onlinenetworks, such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook), digital bill boards,mobile apps, and the like. Media conduits 111 may generate their owncontent 113, or may be broadcasting content from one or more othercontent providers or publishers 115. For example, a cable company is amedia conduit that delivers content from numerous TV channel producersand publishers of content. Media interfaces may also be referred to ascontent providers, generally, because they deliver media content 113 (TVprograms, movies, etc.) to consumers 105. One aspect of the technologyherein includes the ability to aggregate inventory 109 from more thanone type of media interface or content provider. Media conduits 111 alsodeliver advertising content 103 that has been purchased for delivery attime slots 117, to consumers 105 for viewing on various devices 107. Apublisher 115 is typically a content owner (e.g., BBC, ESPN).

A slot 117 is a time, typically expressed as a window of time (1 minute,2 minutes, etc.) at a particular time of day (noon, 4:30 pm, etc., or awindow such as 2-4 pm, or 9 pm-12 am), or during a specified broadcastsuch as a TV program, on a particular broadcast channel (such as a TVstation, or a social media feed). An available slot is a slot in theinventory that an advertiser may purchase for the purpose of deliveringadvertising content. Typically it is available because anotheradvertiser has not yet purchased it. As further described herein, a slotmay additionally be defined by certain constraints such as whether aparticular type of advertising content 103 can be delivered in aparticular slot. For example, a sports equipment manufacturer may havepurchased a particular slot, defined by a particular time of day on aparticular channel, and may have also purchased the right to excludeother sports equipment manufacturers from purchasing slots on the samechannel within a certain boundary—in time—of the first manufacturer'sslot.

In this context, a “hard constraint” is a legal or otherwise mandatorylimitation on placing advertising in particular time slots or withinspecified media. A “soft constraint” refers to desired (non-mandatory)limitations on placing advertising in particular time slots withinspecified media. “Constraint satisfaction” refers to the process offinding a solution to a set of constraints that impose conditions thatthe variables must satisfy. The solution therefore is a set of valuesfor the variables that satisfies all constraints.

Information is intended to mean, broadly, any content that a consumercan view, read, listen to, or any combination of the same, and which ismade available on a screen such as a TV screen, computer screen, ordisplay of a mobile device such as a tablet, smart-phone, orlaptop/notebook computer, a wearable such as a smart-watch, fitnessmonitor, or an in-car or in-plane display screen. Information isprovided by a media interface 111 such as a TV or radio station, amulti-channel video programming distributor (MVPD, such as a cable TVprovider, e.g., Comcast), or an online network such as Yahoo! orFacebook.

VOD refers to video on demand systems, which allow users to select andwatch or listen to video or audio content when they choose to, ratherthan having to watch content at a scheduled broadcast time. Internettechnology is often used to bring video on demand to televisions andpersonal computers. Television VOD systems can either stream contentthrough a set-top box, a computer or other device, allowing viewing inreal time, or download it to a device such as a computer, digital videorecorder (also called a personal video recorder) or portable mediaplayer for viewing at any time.

The communication between the advertisers and the media conduits can bemanaged by up to several entities, including: a demand-side provider(DSP) 123, an advertising exchange 119, and a supply-side provider 121.An advertising exchange 119 (also, exchange herein) is an environment inwhich advertisers can bid on available media inventory. The inventorymay be digital such as via online delivery over the Internet, or viadigital radio such as SiriusXM, or may be analog, such as via a TVchannel such as ESPN, CNN, Fox, or BBC, or an FM/AM radio broadcast. Anadvertising exchange 119 typically specializes in certain kinds ofcontent. For example, SpotX specializes in digital content, WideOrbitspecializes in programmatic TV.

Supply-side provider (SSP) 121 is an intermediary that takes inventory109 from a media conduit 111, and makes it available to a demand-sideprovider (DSP) 123, optionally via exchange 119, so that advertisers canpurchase or bid on the inventory when deciding how to positionadvertising content 103. In some situations, an SSP interacts directlywith a DSP without the need for an advertising exchange; this is true ifthe functions of an advertising exchange that a purchaser of advertisingcontent relies on are performed by one or both of the DSP and SSP. Thetechnology herein is particularly suited for being implemented and beingcarried out by a suitably-configured DSP.

In one configuration, an advertising exchange 119 interfaces between asupply side provider (SSP) 121 and a demand side provider (DSP) 123. Theinterfacing role comprises receiving inventory 109 from one or moreSSP's 121 and making it available to the DSP, then receiving bids 125 onthat inventory from the DSP and providing those bids 125 to the SSP.Thus, a DSP makes it possible for an advertiser to bid on inventoryprovided by a particular SSP such as SpotX, or WideOrbit. In someconfigurations, the DSP takes on most or all of the role of anadvertising exchange.

In one embodiment of the technology herein, a DSP provides a schedulefor an advertising campaign, which, if approved by the advertiser, theDSP has to purchase on its behalf and arrange for the execution of thecampaign. The SSP controls delivery of the advertising content to themedia conduits.

An advertising campaign (or campaign) is a plan, by an advertiser, todeliver advertising content to a particular population of consumers. Acampaign will typically include a selection of advertising content (suchas a particular advertisement or various forms of an advertisement, or asequence of related advertisements intended to be viewed in a particularorder), as well as a period of time for which the campaign is to run(such as 1 week, 1 month, 3 months). An advertiser typically transmits acampaign description 127 to an advertising exchange 119 or a DSP 121,and in return receives a list of the inventory 109 available. A campaigndescription 127 may comprise a single item of advertising content 103and one or more categories of device 107 to target, or may comprise aschedule for sequential delivery of two or more items of advertisingcontent 103 across one or more devices 107. A campaign description 127may also comprise a description of a target audience, wherein the targetaudience is defined by one or more demographic factors selected from,but not limited to: age range, gender, income, and location.

The DSP 123 then provides an interface by which the advertiser 101 canalign its campaign descriptions 127 against inventory 109 and purchase,or bid on, various slots 117 in the inventory. The DSP 123, or anexchange 119, may be able to provide more than one set of inventory thatmatches a given campaign description 127: each set of inventory thatmatches a given campaign description is referred to herein as anadvertising target 129. The advertiser 101 may select from among a listof advertising targets, the target or targets that it wishes topurchase. Once it has purchased a particular target, the SSP 121 isnotified and delivery instructions 137 are sent to the various mediaconduits 111 so that the advertising content 103 can be delivered in theapplicable time slots 117, or during selected content 113, to therelevant consumers.

A purchase of a given slot is not simply a straightforward sale at agiven price, but is achieved via a bidding process. The DSP will placebids on a number of slots, and for each one, will have identified a bidprice that is submitted to the SSP. For a winning bid, the SSP deliversthe advertising content to the media conduit, and ultimately theconsumer. Bids are generally higher for specific targeting than forblanket targeting.

The bidding process depends in part on the type of advertising content.TV content can be scheduled in advance, whereas for online content, thetypical bid structure is ‘just-in-time’ bidding: the advert is deliveredonly if a particular consumer is seen online. In general, the methodsherein are independent of bidding process, and are applicable to any ofthe bidding methods typically deployed, including real-time-bidding, aswell as bidding that exploits details of programmatic TV data. Wherereal-time bidding (RTB) is used, it may, e.g., be utilizing protocol RTB2.0-2.4, see Internet Advertisers Bureau atwww.iab.com/guidelines/real-time-bidding-rtb-project/).

By serving a tag with a given online ad, by using a protocol such asVPAID (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixpo) or VAST (video advertserving template), the tag collects data including whether a consumerclicked on, or viewed, the content. The tag typically contains a numberof items of data relating to how a consumer interacted with theadvertising content. The items of data can be returned to the SSP and/orthe DSP in order to provide feedback on the circumstances of delivery ofthe advertisement. For example, the items of data can include a datumrelating to whether a user clicked on a video online. Certain items ofdata correspond to events that are referred to in the industry as“beacon” events because of their salience to an advertiser: for examplea beacon event can include the fact that a user stopped a video segmentbefore it completed.

The process of generating advertising targets may also depend one ormore campaign requirements. A campaign requirement, as used herein,refers to financial constraints such as a budget, and performancespecifications such as a number of consumers to target, set by anadvertiser or other purchaser of advertising inventory. Campaignrequirement information is used along with campaign descriptions whenpurchasing or bidding on inventory.

DSP's 123 also provide advertisers 101 with data on consumers anddevices, aggregated from various sources. This data helps an advertiserchoose from the inventory, those time slots and media conduits that willbest suit its goals.

Data used by DSP's may include census data 131, or data on specificconsumers and devices 133. Census data 131 includes data on a populationthat can be used to optimize purchase of inventory. Census data 131 cantherefore include demographic data such as age distribution, incomevariations, and marital status, among a population in a particularviewing region independent of what media interfaces the members of thepopulation actually view. Census data 131 can be aggregated from avariety of sources, such as state and county records, and U.S. CensusBureau data.

A data management platform (DMP) 135 can provide other types of thirdparty data 133 regarding consumers and the devices they use to the DSP.Examples of DMP's include: Krux, Exelate, Nielsen, Lotame. The consumerand device data 133 that is delivered to a DSP from a third partyprovider may complement other consumer and device data 143 that isprovided by the media conduits. Data on consumers and the devices theyuse that is relevant to an advertiser includes matters of viewing habitsas well as specific behavioral data that can be retrieved directly froma media conduit. For example, as further discussed elsewhere herein,when a media conduit serves an advertisement to a consumer, the conduitcan collect information on that user's manner of access to the advert.Due to the volume of data involved, after a relatively short period oftime, such as 14 days, a media conduit may not be able to furnish anyinformation on a particular consumer. In that instance, the DSP can getdata on that user from a third party such as a DMP. Third parties canget data offline as well. As used herein, an offline event is one thathappens independently of the Internet or a TV view: for example, it caninclude purchase of an item from a store and other types oflocation-based events that an advertiser can view as significant. Datacan be shared between the entities herein (e.g., between a DMP and aDSP, and between DSP and SSP, and between media conduits and a SSP oradvertising exchange) using any commonly accepted file formats forsharing and transfer of data: these formats include, but are not limitedto: JSON, CSV, and Thrift, as well as any manner of text fileappropriately formatted.

An impression refers to any instance in which an advertisement reaches aconsumer. On a TV, it is assumed that if the TV is broadcasting theadvertisement then an individual known to be the owner of, or a regularviewer of, that TV will have been exposed to the advertisement, and thatdisplay counts as an impression. If multiple persons are in the samehousehold then the number of impressions may equal the number of personswho can view that TV. In the online environment, an impression occurs ifa consumer is viewing, say, a web-page and the advertisement isdisplayed on that web-page such as in the form of a pop-up, or if theuser has clicked on a link which causes the advertisement to run.

An audience segment is a list of consumers, de-identified from theirpersonally identifiable information using cookie syncing or othermethods, where the consumers belong to a type (income, gender,geographic location, etc.), or are associated with a behavior:purchases, TV viewership, site visits, etc.

Cookie syncing refers to a process that allows data exchange betweenDMP's SSP's and DSP's, and more generally between publishers of contentand advertisement buyers. A cookie is a file that a mobile device ordesktop computer uses to retain and restore information about aparticular user or device. The information in a cookie is typicallyprotected so that only an entity that created the cookie cansubsequently retrieve the information from it. Cookie syncing is a wayin which one entity can obtain information about a consumer from thecookie created by another entity, without necessarily obtaining theexact identify of the consumer. Thus, given information about aparticular consumer received from a media conduit, through cookiesyncing it is possible to add further information about that consumerfrom a DMP.

For mobile devices, there is a device ID, unique to a particular device.For TV's there is a hashed IP address. The device ID information may beused to link a group f devices to a particular consumer, as well as linka number of consumers, for example in a given household, to a particulardevice. A DSP may gather a store of data, built up over time, inconjunction with mobile device ID's and TV addresses, that augment‘cookie’ data.

Cross-screen refers to distribution of media data, including advertisingcontent, across multiple devices of a given consumer, such as a TVscreen, computer screen, or display of a mobile device such as a tablet,smart-phone or laptop/notebook computer, a wearable such as asmart-watch or fitness monitor, or an in-car, or in-plane displayscreen, or a display on a networked domestic appliance such as arefrigerator.

Reach is the total number of different people exposed to anadvertisement, at least once, during a given period.

In a cross-screen advertising or media campaign, the same consumer canbe exposed to an advertisement multiple times, through different devices(such as TV, desktop or mobile) that the consumer uses.

Deduplicated reach is the number of different people exposed to anadvertisement irrespective of the device. For example, if a particularconsumer has seen an advertisement on his/her TV, desktop and one ormore mobile devices, that consumer only contributes 1 to the reach.

The incremental reach is the additional deduplicated reach for acampaign, over and above the reach achieved before starting, such asfrom a prior campaign. In one embodiment herein, a type of campaign caninclude a TV extension: in this circumstance, an advertiser has alreadyrun a campaign on TV, but is reaching a point of diminished returns. Theadvertiser wants to find ways to modify the campaign plan for a digitalmarket, in order to increase the reach. In this way, a DSP may inherit acampaign that has already run its course on one or more media conduits.

In addition to TV programming content, and online content delivered todesktop computers and mobile devices, advertisements may be deliveredwithin OTT content. OTT (which derives from the term “over the top”)refers to the delivery of audio, and video, over the Internet withoutthe involvement of a MVPD in the control or distribution of the content.Thus, OTT content is anything not tied to particular box or device. Forexample, Netflix, or HBO-Go, deliver OTT content because a consumerdoesn't need a specific device to view the content. By contrast, MVPDcontent such as delivered to a cable or set top box is controlled by acable or satellite provider such as Comcast, AT&T or DirecTV, and is notdescribed as OTT. OTT in particular refers to content that arrives froma third party, such as Sling TV, YuppTV, Amazon Instant Video, Mobibase,Dramatize, Presto, DramaFever, Crackle, HBO, Hulu, myTV, Netflix, NowTV, Qello, RPI TV, Viewster, WhereverTV, Crunchyroll or WWE Network, andis delivered to an end-user device, leaving the Internet serviceprovider (ISP) with only the role of transporting IP packets.

Furthermore, an OTT device is any device that is connected to theinternet and that can access a multitude of content. For example, Xbox,Roku, Tivo, Hulu (and other devices that can run on top of cable), adesktop computer, and a smart TV, are examples of OTT devices.

Gross rating point (GRP) refers to the size of an advertising campaignaccording to schedule and media conduits involved, and is given by thenumber of impressions per member of the target audience, expressed as apercentage (GRP can therefore be a number >100. For example, if anadvert reaches 30% of the population of L.A. 4 times, the GRP is 120.(The data may be measured by, e.g., a Nielsen panel of say 1,000 viewersin L.A.).

The target rating point (TRP) refers to the number of impressions pertarget audience member, based on a sample population. This numberrelates to individuals: e.g., within L.A. the advertiser wants to targetmales, 25 and older. If there are 100 such persons in the L.A. panel and70% saw the ad., then the TRP is 70% X number of views.

Real-time refers to real-time computing, and is defined as a computingsystem that can receive and process data, and return analyzed resultssufficiently rapidly (such as within a matter of seconds) that iteffectively does not cause delay to a party who relies upon the resultsfor decision-making purposes. It is to be assumed that the processes forallowing an advertiser to select, bid on, and purchase advertisinginventory, as described herein, can be carried out in real-time.

“Device Graph” refers to the association of users with devices on whichthey consume media.

Consumer Data

Data about consumers can be categorized into two groups: there arenon-transmutable characteristics such as ethnicity, and gender; andthere are transmutable characteristics such as age, profession, address,marital status, income, taste and preferences. Various transmutablecharacteristics such as profession are subject to change at any time,while others such as age change at a consistence rate. Today, the datasystems that track consumer information for use in targeting advertisingcontent lack the ability to broadly track both categories of consumerdata. Most data systems contain static, homogenous classifications ofconsumers. For example, a 29-year old who bought a car two years agowill be a consumer data point that will not be updated or augmented withtime. Even if the age of the individual as stored in a system can beadjusted with time, other transmutable characteristics such as change inmarital state, or lifestyle changes, are not taken into account in thisconsumer's classification.

At various stages of the methods herein, it is described that eachconsumer in a population of consumers is treated in a particular way bythe method: for example, a computer may be programmed to analyze data oneach consumer in its database in order to ascertain which, if any, haveviewed a particular TV show, or visited a particular website;alternatively, some comparative analysis may be performed, in whichattributes of each user in one category of population are compared withattributes of each consumer in another category of population. Eachpopulation set may comprise many thousands of individuals, or manyhundreds of thousands, or even millions or many millions of individuals.It is assumed herein that the methods, when deployed on suitablecomputing resources, are capable of carrying out stated calculations andmanipulations on each and every member of the populations in question.However, it is also consistent with the methods herein that “eachconsumer” in a population may also mean most consumers in thepopulation, or all consumers in the population for whom the statedcalculation is feasible. For example, where one or more given consumersin a population is omitted from a particular calculation because thereis insufficient data on the individual, that does not mean that aninsufficient number of members of the population is analyzed in order toprovide a meaningful outcome of the calculation. Thus “each” whenreferencing a population of potentially millions of consumers does notnecessarily mean exactly every member of the population but may mean alarge and practically reasonable number of members of the population,which for the purposes of a given calculation is sufficient to produce aresult.

The methods herein can include performing corrections or normalizationsof other consumer data based on census data, if, for example, there is amismatch for the demographic data from census and that from othersources. This might occur if the majority of consumer data from an areareflects incomes of relatively high income, yet the area as a whole isimpoverished, with only pockets of wealth.

Consumer Graph

A consumer graph is a graph in which each node represents a consumer (orindividual user). The technology utilizes various implementations of aweighted graph representation in which relationships between consumers(nodes) are defined as degrees of similarity (edges). A consumer graphis used herein to categorize, store, and aggregate large amounts ofconsumer data, and allow an entity such as a DSP to make connectionsbetween data used to build a consumer graph with other data—such as TVviewing data—via data on given consumers' devices.

One way to construct the graph is by using deterministic relationshipdata; another is probabilistically using the attributes of each node. Insome instances, a combination of deterministic and probabilistic methodscan be used. In a deterministic, approach, which is relativelystraightforward, the basis is having exact data on a consumer, such aslogin information from a publisher. Thus, if a person has logged inmultiple times on different devices with the same ID, then it ispossible to be sure that the person's identity is matched. However, suchexact information may not always be available. By contrast, in aprobabilistic approach, it is necessary to draw inferences: for example,if the same device is seen in the same location, or similar behavior canbe attributed to a given device at different times, then it possible toconclude that the device belongs to the same user.

In some embodiments herein, machine learning methods, and Bayesian andregression algorithms, are used to explore commonalities betweenconsumers. Such methods are useful in situations where there is a finitenumber of parameters to be considered. In some other embodiments,techniques of deep learning are more useful in finding consumersimilarities and constructing a consumer graph. Machine learning is apreferred technique for matching exact pieces of information, forexample whether the same websites have been visited by two consumers,but deep learning can explore the details of a particular video or TVprogram—for example, by analyzing natural scene statistics—and therebyascertain, for example, whether two adverts that were viewed by a givenconsumer have something in common beyond their subject matter. Forexample, two adverts may include the same actor and be liked by aconsumer for that reason, even though the products portrayed have littlein common.

In preferred embodiments, the device graph herein is based onprobabilistic data. The probabilistic approach to graph constructionuses behavioral data such as viewership habits to match up users.

In some embodiments an entity, such as a DSP, can construct a devicegraph; in other embodiments it can obtain, such as purchase, it fromanother entity such as a DMP.

In various embodiments herein, both a device graph and a consumer graphare operating together in a manner that permits tying in mobile data toTV data.

The term graph is used herein in its mathematical sense, as a set G(N,E) of nodes (N) and edges (E) connecting pairs of nodes. Graph G is arepresentation of the relationships between the nodes: two nodes thatare connected by an edge are similar to one another according to somecriterion, and the weight of an edge defines the strength of thesimilarity. Pairs of nodes that do not meet the similarity criterion arenot joined by an edge. FIG. 2 illustrates graph concepts, showing 6nodes, N₁-N₆, in which three pairs of nodes are connected by edges.

In the implementation of a graph herein, a node, N, is an entity orobject with a collection of attributes, A. In FIG. 2, each node hasassociated with it an array of attributes, denoted Ai for node Ni.

In the implementation of a graph herein, an edge, E, existing betweentwo nodes indicates the existence of a relationship, or level ofsimilarity, between the two nodes that is above a defined threshold. Theweight of an edge, w_E, is the degree of similarity of the two nodes.The weights of the edges in FIG. 2 are shown diagrammatically asthicknesses (in which case, w_E₁₂>w_E₃₄>w_E₁₅).

In a consumer graph, a node represents an individual, or a householdcomprising two or more individuals, with a set of attributes such as thegender(s) and age(s) of the individual(s), history of TV programswatched, web-sites visited, etc.

FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary structure of a node of a consumer graph.Each node has a collection of attributes that include types andbehaviors, for which data is continuously collected from first party andthird party sources. Many of the attributes are transmutable if newinformation for the consumer becomes available, and the collection ofattributes (i.e., the number of different attributes stored for a givenconsumer) can also grow over time as new data is collected about theconsumer. An aspect of the technology herein is that the graph isconstructed from a potentially unlimited number of inputs for a givenconsumer, such as online, offline, behavioral, and demographic data.Those inputs are updated over time and allow the data for a givenconsumer to be refined, as well as allow the population of consumers onwhich data can be used to be expanded. The fact that there is no limitto the type and character of data that can be employed means that themethods herein are superior to those employed by panel companies, whichrely on static datasets and fixed populations.

Some of the sources from which data is collected are as follows.

Type data is categorical data about a consumer that normally does notchange, i.e., is immutable. Behavioral data is continuously updatedbased on a consumer's recent activity.

Each node includes a grouping of one or more devices (desktop, mobile,tablets, smart TV). For each device, data on the type of the user basedon the device is collected from third party and first party sources.

Table 1 shows examples of data by category and source.

TABLE 1 1^(st) Party 3^(rd) Party Non-transmutable Census (Govt.)Household income Education Level (e.g., from Exelate) Gender (e.g., fromNielsen, DAR) Transmutable Behavior (online) Offline Behavior TV viewingRetail Purchases Viewability (how much of advert Offsite visits (visitedseen, kept on, visible online?) pharmacy, movie theater, Online sitesvisited car dealership, etc.) Location events

First party data comprises data on a user's behavior, for example:purchases, viewership, site visits, etc., as well as types such asincome, gender, provided directly by a publisher to improve targetingand reporting on their own campaigns. (For example, the Coca-ColaCompany might provide to a DSP, a list of users who “like” Coke productson social media to improve their video advertising campaigns.) Firstparty type data can be collected from advertisements served directly tothe device, and from information collected from the device, such as oneor more IP addresses. First party type data includes location from IPaddress, geolocation from mobile devices, and whether the device islocated in a commercial or residential property.

Third party type data is obtained from external vendors. Through aone-on-one cookie synchronization or a device synchronization, anexternal vendor, for example a DMP such as Krux (www.krux.com/),Experian (which provides purchase behavior data), or Adobe, providesinformation about the cookie or device. Example data includes marketsegment occupied by the consumer, such as age range, gender, incomelevel, education level, political affiliation, and preferences such aswhich brands the consumer likes or follows on social media.Additionally, external vendors can provide type data based on recentpurchases attributed to the device. Third party data includesinformation such as gender and income because it is not collecteddirectly from external vendors. Third party data can be collectedwithout serving an advertisement. TV programs viewed and purchases arethird party data.

First Party data is typically generated by a DSP; for example, it isdata that the DSP can collect from serving an Ad or a Brand/Agency thatprovides the data. First party data includes data that depends on havingserved an Ad to have access to it.

Behavioral data can be collected from the devices through first partyand third party sources. Behaviors are first party data typically.Behaviors are mutable.

First party behavioral data is collected from advertisements serveddirectly to the device. This includes websites visited, and the TVprogram, or OTT, or video on demand (VOD) content viewed by the device.

Third party behavioral data is obtained from external vendors, typicallyDMP's such as Experian, Krux, Adobe, Nielsen and Comscore, andadvertising exchanges or networks, such as BrightRoll, SpotX, FreeWheel,Hulu. Example data includes the history of TV programming viewed on thedevice in the last month, the history of websites visited by a personalcomputer or laptop, or mobile device, and history of location basedevents from mobile devices (for example, whether the device was at aStarbucks). In some instances, the same types of data can be obtainedfrom both first party and third party entities.

Edges between the nodes in the consumer graph signify that the consumershave a threshold similarity, or interact with each other. The edges canbe calculated deterministically, for example, if the nodes are inphysical proximity, or probabilistically based on similarity inattributes. Probabilistic methods utilized include, but are not limitedto: K-means clustering, and connected components analysis (which isbased on graph traversal methods involving constructing a path acrossthe graph, from one vertex to another. Since the attributes aretransmutable, the edges can also change, either in their weighting or bybeing created or abolished if the similarity score for a pair of nodesalters. Thus the graph is not static, and can change over time. In someembodiments, change is dynamic: similarity scores are continuallyrecalculated as nodes attributes for nodes are updated.

Typically, attributes and data are added dynamically (as they areobtained). The graph may be re-constructed weekly to take account of thenew attributes and data, thereby establishing new weightings for theedges, and identifying newly connected or reconnected devices. (Graphconstruction and reconstruction may be done in the cloud, or on adatacenter under the control of the DSP.)

The similarity, S, between two nodes N_1, N_2, is calculated accordingto a similarity metric, which is the inverse of a distance function,f(N_1, N_2):N_1, N_2→S, that defines the similarity of two nodes basedon their attributes.

In a consumer graph, similarity represents the likeness of twoindividuals in terms of their demographic attributes and their viewingpreferences. Similarities can be calculated, attribute by attribute, andthen the individual similarity attributes weighted and combined togetherto produce an overall similarity score for a pair of nodes.

When the attributes of two nodes are represented by binary vectors,there are a number of metrics that can be used to define a similaritybetween a pair of nodes based on that attribute. Any one of thesemetrics is suitable for use with the technology herein. In someembodiments, for efficiency of storage, a binary vector can berepresented as a bit-string, or an array of bit-strings.

When working with a similarity metric that is the inverse of a distancefunction, f(N_i, N_j), a zero value of the distance function signifiesthat the types and behaviors of the two nodes are identical. Conversely,a large value of the distance function signifies that the two nodes aredissimilar. An example of a distance function is Euclidean distance,f(N_i,N_j)=∥A_i−A_j∥{circumflex over ( )}2

where A_i, and A_j are the sparse vectors representing the attributes ofnodes N_i and N_j, and the distance is computed as a sum of the squaresof the differences of in the values of corresponding components of eachvector.

Comparisons of binary vectors or bit-strings can be accomplishedaccording to one or more of several similarity metrics, of which themost popular is the Tanimoto coefficient. Other popular metrics include,but are not limited to: Cosine, Dice, Euclidean, Manhattan, city block,Euclidean, Hamming, and Tversky. Another distance metric that can beused is the LDA (latent Dirichlet allocation). Another way of defining adistance comparison is via a deep learning embedding, in which it ispossible to learn the best form of the distance metric instead of fixingit as, e.g., the cosine distance. An example approach is via manifoldlearning.

The cosine dot product is a preferred metric that can be used to definea similarity between the two nodes in a consumer graph. The cosinesimilarity, that is the dot product of A_i and A_j, is given by:f(N_i,N_j)=A_i.A_j

In this instance, the vectors are each normalized so that theirmagnitudes are 1.0. A value of 1.0 for the cosine similarity metricindicates two nodes that are identical. Conversely, the nearer to 0.0 isthe value of the cosine metric, the more dissimilar are the two nodes.The cosine metric can be converted into a distance-like quantity bysubtracting its value from 1.0:f′(N_i,N_j)=1−A_i.A_j

An example of a more complex distance function is a parameterizedKernel, such as a radial basis function.f(N_i,N_j)=exp(∥A_i−A_j∥{circumflex over ( )}2/s{circumflex over ( )}2),where s is a parameter.

In the more general case in which the bit-string is a vector thatcontains numbers other than 1 and 0 (for example it contains percentagesor non-normalized data), then one can calculate similarity based ondistance metrics between vectors of numbers. Other metrics, such as theMahalanobis distance, may then be applicable.

Typically, a similarity score, S, is a number between 0 and 100, thoughother normalization schemes could be used, such as a number between 0and 1.0, a number between 0 and 10, or a number between 0 and 1,000. Itis also possible that a scoring system could be un-normalized, andsimply be expressed as a number proportional to the calculatedsimilarity between two consumers.

In some embodiments, when calculating a similarity score, eachcontributing factor can be weighted by a coefficient that expresses therelative importance of the factor. For example, a person's gender can begiven a higher weighting than whether they watched a particular TV show.The weightings can be initially set by application of heuristics, andcan ultimately be derived from a statistical analysis of advertisingcampaign efficacy that is continually updated over time. Other methodsof deriving a weighting coefficient used to determine the contributionof a particular attribute to the similarity score include: regression,or feature selection such as least absolute shrinkage and selectionoperator (“LASSO”). Alternatively, it is possible to fit to “groundtruth data”, e.g., login data. In some embodiments, as the system triesdifferent combinations or features, which one leads to greaterprecision/recall can be deduced by using a “held out” test data set(where that feature is not used in construction of the graph).

Another way of deriving a similarity score for a feature is to analyzedata from a successive comparison of advertising campaigns to consumerfeedback using a method selected from: machine learning; neural networksand other multi-layer perceptrons; support vector machines; principalcomponents analysis; Bayesian classifiers; Fisher Discriminants; LinearDiscriminants; Maximum Likelihood Estimation; Least squares estimation;Logistic Regressions; Gaussian Mixture Models; Genetic Algorithms;Simulated Annealing; Decision Trees; Projective Likelihood; k-NearestNeighbor; Function Discriminant Analysis; Predictive Learning via RuleEnsembles; Natural Language Processing, State Machines; Rule Systems;Probabilistic Models; Expectation-Maximization; and Hidden and maximumentropy Markov models. Each of these methods can assess the relevance ofa given attribute of a consumer for purposes of suitability formeasuring effectiveness of an advertising campaign, and provide aquantitative weighting of each.

Representation

To properly assess an entire population of consumers, a large number ofnodes needs to be stored. Additionally, the collection of attributesthat represent a node's types and behaviors can be sizeable. Storing thecollection of the large number of attributes for the nodes ischallenging, since the number of nodes can be as many as hundreds ofmillions. Storing the data efficiently is also important since the graphcomputations can be done most quickly and efficiently if the node datais stored in memory.

In a preferred embodiment, attributes are represented by sparse vectors.In order to accomplish such a representation, the union of all possiblenode attributes for a given type is stored in a dictionary. Then thetype, or behavior, for each node is represented as a binary sparsevector, where 1 and 0 represent the presence and absence of anattribute, respectively. Since the number of possible attributes of agiven type is very large, most of the entries will be 0 for a givenconsumer. Thus it is only necessary to store the addresses of thoseattributes that are non zero, and each sparse vector can be storedefficiently, typically in less than 1/100^(th) of the space that wouldbe occupied by the full vector.

As an example, let the attributes encode the TV programs that a givenconsumer has viewed in the last month. The system enumerates allpossible TV shows in the dictionary, which can be up to 100,000different shows. For each node, whether the consumer watched the show inthe last month is indicated with a 1, and a 0 otherwise.

If the attributes indicate different income levels, multiple incomelevels are enumerated, and a 1 represents that the consumer belongs to aparticular income level (and all other entries are 0).

Thus for a consumer, i, having an annual income in the range$30,000-$60,000, and who has viewed “Top Gear” in the last month, thefollowing is established:

TV_Dictionary={“Walking Dead”, “Game of Thrones”, . . . , “Top Gear”}

TV_i=[0, 0, . . . , 1]

TV_i can be stored as simply [4]; only the 4^(th) element of the vectoris non-zero. Similarly, for income:

-   -   Income_Dictionary={<$30,000, $30,000-$60,000, $60,000-$100,000,        >$100,000}    -   Income_i=[0, 1, 0, 0]

Income_i can be stored as simply [2], as only the second element of thevector is non-zero.

All the attributes of a node, i, can thus be efficiently representedwith sparse vectors. This requires 2 to 3 orders of magnitude lessmemory than a dense representation.

Graph Construction

FIGS. 4A and 4B illustrate a flow-chart for steps in construction of aconsumer graph. Preferably computer system performing the method isflexibly programmed and thereby relies on an ability to accept anunlimited number of inputs including but not limited to: behavioral suchas specific viewing and purchasing histories of individual consumers, aswell as demographic, and location-related sources.

Initially, the graph is a collection of devices, which are mapped toconsumers. Multiple data sources are used to group multiple devices(tablet, mobile, TV, etc.) to a single consumer. This typically utilizesagglomerative techniques. In order to attribute a single device (e.g., aSmart TV) to multiple consumers, a refinement technique is used.

With agglomerative methods, multiple devices can be grouped to a singleconsumer (or graph node). Some data sources used for this include, butare not limited to:

IP addresses: multiple devices belonging to same IP address indicates asingle consumer or a household.

Geolocation: multiple devices that are nearby, using latitude andlongitude, can be attributed to a single consumer.

Publisher logins: if the same consumer is logged in from multipledevices, those devices can be associated with that consumer.

During this process, the consumer's identity is masked, to obviateprivacy concerns. The result is a single consumer ID that linksparticular devices together.

Let P(d_i, d_j) be the probability that the two devices, d_i and d_j,belong to the same node (consumer, or household). From multiple datasetsobtained from different categories of device, it is possible toconstruct the probability:P(d_i,d_j)=w_IP×P(d_i,d_j|IP)×w_Geo×P(d_i,d_j|Geo)×w_Login×P(d_i,d_j|Login)/Z

where “X” means “multiply”, where w_ are weighting factors, P(d_i,d_j|Y) is a conditional probability (the probability of observing devicei and device j belong to same user, if Y has the same value for both,and Z is a normalizing factor. Thus, Y may be an IP address. (The valueof the conditional probability may be 0.80). Each data source gets adifferent weighing factor: for example, login data can be weightedhigher than IP addresses. The weights can be fixed, or learned from anindependent validation dataset.

Once multiple devices are grouped to a single node, the Types andBehaviors from the respective devices are aggregated to the singularnode's attributes. For example, attributes (and the corresponding sparsevectors) from mobile (such as location events), and desktop (recentpurchases) are aggregated. This provides more comprehensive informationfor a consumer, permitting more accurate and meaningful inferences for anode to be made.

Associating a device with a given consumer is possible due to the datathat is associated with those devices and known to various mediaconduits. For examples, a Smart-TV stores location information as wellas subscription information about the content broadcast by it. Thisinformation is shared with, and can be obtained from, other entitiessuch as a cable company. Similarly, a mobile device such as a tablet orsmartphone may be associated with the same (in-home) wifi network as theSmart-TV. Information about the location is therefore shared with, e.g.,the cell-phone carrier, as well as broadcasters of subscription contentto the mobile device. A key aspect of the graph methodology herein isthat it permits consumer information to be linked across differentdevice and media platforms that have typically been segregated from oneanother: in particular, the graph herein is able to link consumer datafrom online and offline purchasing and viewing sources with TV viewingdata.

With refinement methods, a single device (for example, a smart TV) canbe associated with multiple consumers (or graph nodes) who, for example,own mobile devices that are connected to the same wifi network as thesmart-TV.

Given a node, n, to which are assigned multiple devices, the variousattributes are clustered into smaller groups of devices, for example, aTV ID, connected to multiple devices from a common IP address. The TVviewership data is aggregated along with the attributes from all thedevices. A clustering algorithm, such as k-means clustering, can beapplied to group the devices into smaller clusters. The number ofclusters, k, can be set generally by the number of devices (by defaultk=# number of devices/4). Sometimes it is possible to only collectaggregate data at a household level. For example, there may be as manyas 20 devices in one household. But by using behavioral data, it can beascertained that the 20 devices have 4 major clusters, say with 5devices each, where the clusters correspond to different individualswithin the same household. Thus, although there are two categories ofdevice (shared and personal), it is still important to attributebehavioral data to users.

Once a shared device is attributed to multiple nodes, the data collectedfrom the device can be attributed to the nodes. For example, TV viewingdata from a Smart TV can be collected from the OEM. Through thisattribution, the TV viewing data can be added to the collection of anode's attributes. Ultimately, a Smart-TV can be attributed to differentpersons in the same household.

Lookalike Modeling by Learning Distance Functions

Given a graph, G(N, E), and a functional form that defines a similaritymetric, and a set of seed nodes, it is possible to generate a set of“lookalike” nodes that are similar to the seed nodes, where similarityis defined by a function that is fixed, or learned. This is useful whenidentifying new consumers who may be interested in the same or similarcontent as a group of consumers already known to an advertiser. Similarprinciples can be utilized when projecting likely viewing behavior ofconsumers from historical data on a population of consumers.

Seed nodes can be a set of nodes, e.g., household(s) or individual(s),from which to generate a set of lookalike nodes using a fixed, orlearned, similarity metric. For example, seed nodes can be defined as anaudience segment (such as list of users that saw a specific show forcertain). This is useful for determining, for each member of theaudience segment, a list of other audience members who might havesimilar viewing habits even if they did not watch exactly the same showas the seeds.

Given the set of seed nodes in a graph (and their attributes), theoutput of lookalike modeling is a set of nodes (that includes the seednodes) that are similar to the seed nodes based on the fixed or learnedsimilarity metric.

Several different vectors can be used in determining look-alike models:One is the vector of TV programs in total. This vector can be as long as40 k elements. Another vector is the list of consumers who saw aparticular program (e.g., The Simpsons). The vector of viewers for agiven TV program can be as long as 10M elements, because it contains oneelement per consumer. Another vector would be a vector of web-sitesvisited (say 100 k elements long). Still another vector would be basedon online videos viewed (which can also be 100 k elements long).

In general, TV program comparison data accesses a 10M user base. Onlinedata can identify a potentially much larger audience, such as 150Mconsumers. It should be understood that TV data can be accumulatedacross a variety of TV consumption de

The similarity between 2 distinct nodes can be calculated from theirattributes, represented by sparse vectors. Given a distance functionf(N_i, N_j), and a set of seed nodes, N_S, the pairwise distancesbetween each element of the seed nodes, n in N_S, and all other nodesother than the seed node, n′, are calculated. That is, all quantitiesf(n, n′) are calculated.

After calculating all pairwise similarities, only the nodes such thatf(n, n′)<T are selected. T is a threshold maximum distance below whichthe nodes are deemed to be similar. Alternatively, values of f(n, n′)(where n is not n′) are ranked in decreasing order, and the top t nodepairs are selected. In either case, T and t are parameters that arepreset (provided to the method), or learned from ground truth orvalidation data. The set of all nodes n′ that satisfy the criteriaabove, form the set of “lookalike nodes”.

Graph Inference

Given a graph G(N, E), it is also possible to infer likely attributes ofa node, n, based on the attributes of its neighbors in the graph. Thiscan be useful when incomplete information exists for a given consumerbut where enough exists from which inferences can be drawn. For example,TV viewership attributes may be missing for a node n (in general, thereis either positive information if a user did watch a show, or it isunknown whether they watched it), whereas those attributes are availablefor neighbor nodes n′, n″ in the graph. Nodes n, n′, and n″ contain allother attributes, such as income level and websites visited.

In another example, it can be useful to calculate the probability thatthe consumer associated with node n would watch the show “Walking Dead”,given that n′, n″ both also watch “Walking Dead”. If the similarity,given by the weight of the edges between n and n′, n″, are w′, w″=0.8and 0.9 respectively, and the likelihood of n watching the show based onhis/her own attributes is 0.9, then the probability is given by:

$\begin{matrix}{{P\left( {n\mspace{14mu}{watches}\mspace{14mu}{``{{Walking}\mspace{14mu}{Dead}}"}} \right)} =} & {\left\lbrack {{0.8 \times 0.9} + {0.9 \times 0.9}} \right\rbrack/\left\lbrack {{0.8 \times 0.9} +} \right.} \\ & {{0.9 \times 0.9} + \left( {1 - {0.8 \times 0.9}} \right) +} \\ & \left. \left( {1 - {0.9 \times 0.9}} \right) \right\rbrack \\{=} & {0.765}\end{matrix}$

Similar principles can be utilized when projecting likely viewingbehavior of consumers from historical data on a population of consumers.

Accuracy

The graph is continually refined as new data is received. In oneembodiment, a technique such as machine learning is used to improve thequality of graph over time. This may be done at periodic intervals, forexample at a weekly build stage.

To determine the accuracy of the graph, the precision and recall can becompared against a validation dataset. The validation dataset istypically a (sub)graph where the device and node relationships are knownwith certainty. For example, the login information from an onlinenetwork such as eHarmony, indicates when the same user has logged intothe site from different desktops (office, laptop), and mobile devices(smartphone and tablet). All the devices that are frequently used tologin to the site are thus tied to the same consumer and thereby thatindividual's graph node. This information can be used to validatewhether the constructed graph ties those devices to the same node.

If D is the set of devices in the validation set, let Z(D) denote thegraph, consisting of a set of nodes, constructed from the set ofdevices, D. For different datasets, and different graph constructionmethods, it is possible to obtain different results for Z(D).

For the set Z(D), true positive (TP), false positive (FP), and falsenegative (FN) rates can all be calculated. True positives are all nodesin Z(D) that are also nodes in the validation set. False positives areall nodes in N(D) that do not belong to the set of nodes in thevalidation set. False negatives are all nodes that belong to thevalidation set, but do not belong to Z(D).

Precision, defined as TP/(TP+FP), is the fraction of retrieved devicesthat are correctly grouped as consumer nodes.

Recall, defined as TP/(TP+FN), is the fraction of the consumer nodesthat are correctly grouped.

Depending on the application at hand, there are different tradeoffsbetween precision and recall. In the case of constructing a consumergraph, it is preferable to obtain both high precision and high recallrates that can be used to compare different consumer graphs.

The validation dataset must not have been used in the construction ofthe graph itself because, by doing so, bias is introduced into theprecision and recall values.

Learning the Similarity Metric:

Another feature of the graph that can be adjusted as more data isintroduced is the underlying similarity metric. Typically, the metric isfixed for long periods of time, say 5-10 iterations of the graph, andthe metric is not reassessed at the same frequency as the accuracy.

In the case where the distance function is not fixed, it is possible tolearn the parameters of a particular distance function, or to choose thebest distance function from a family of such functions. In order tolearn the distance function or its parameters, the values of precisionand recall are compared against a validation set.

Suppose a goal is to predict the lookalike audience segment that arehigh income earners, based on the attributes of a seed set of known highincome earners. The similarity of the seed nodes to all other nodes inthe graph is calculated for different distance functions, or parametersof a particular distance function. The distance function uses theattributes of the nodes, such as online and TV viewership, to calculatethe similarities.

For example, if the distance function is the radial basis function withparameter, s:f(N_i,N_j)=exp(∥A_i−A_j∥{circumflex over ( )}2/s{circumflex over ( )}2),

then the pairwise distances from the seed nodes to all other nodes, arecalculated for different values of s, using the same threshold distancevalue, T, to generate the set of lookalike nodes. For different valuesof s (the parameter that needs to be learned), the calculations producedifferent sets of lookalike nodes, denoted by N_S(s).

For the set N_S(s), it is possible to calculate true positive (TP),false positive (FP) and false negative (FN) rates. True positives areall nodes in N_S(s) that also belong to the target set in the validationset. In this example, all the nodes that are also high income earners(in ground truth set). False positives are all nodes in N_S(s) that donot belong to the target set (not high income earners). False positivesare all nodes in N_S(s) that do not belong to the target set (not highincome earners). False negatives are all nodes that belong to thevalidation set (are high income earners), but do not belong to N_S(s).

Based on the application, it is possible to require different tradeoffsbetween precision and recall. In the case of targeting an audience withan advertisement, a high recall rate is desired, since the cost ofexposure (an advertisement) is low, whereas the cost of missing a memberof a targeted audience is high.

In the example herein, the aim is to choose the value of s for whichboth the precision and recall rates are high from amongst possiblevalues of s. For other types of distance function, there may be otherparameters for which to try to maximize the precision and recall rates.

The accuracy of a lookalike model can only be defined for a targetaudience segment. For example, it is possible to predict whether alookalike segment also comprises high income earners, from a seed set ofhigh income earners using TV viewing and online behavior datasets.Predictions can be validated using a true set of income levels for thepredicted set of nodes. This gives the accuracy of the predictions.However, the accuracy of predictions for one segment are not meaningfulfor a new target segment, such as whether those same users are alsoluxury car drivers.

Calculating Deduplicated Reach

The consumer graph connects a node (consumer) to all the devices that heor she uses. Thus the graph enables deduplicating the total exposure toan advertisement, to individuals. For example, if user abc123 hasalready seen a particular advertisement on each of his TV, desktop andmobile device, the total deduplicated exposures will count as 1. Thisenables the calculation of the following metrics for direct measurement.

The deduplicated exposed audience is the number of users belonging tothe target audience segment in the consumer graph who were exposed tothe advertisement after deduplication. Then, the direct deduplicatedreach is:Deduplicated Reach=Deduplicated Exposed Audience/Total Audience

For sampled measurement, this enables the calculation of thededuplicated exposed sampled audience as the number of sampled users whobelong to the target audience segment who were exposed to theadvertisement after deduplication. Then, the sampled reach is:Deduplicated Sampled Reach=Deduplicated Exposed Sampled Audience/TotalSampled Audience

In the case of modeled measurement data, the ID of the user in theconsumer graph from whom the data was collected is not known. Hence, thereach data cannot be deduplicated on a one-to-one level.

Calculation of deduplicated reach can be useful in sequential targeting,if an advertiser wants to impose a frequency cap on consumers (forexample, if the advertiser doesn't want to show the same advert to thesame user more than twice). Deduplicated reach also provides aconvenient metric by which to optimize the efficacy of an advertisingcampaign: for example, by calculating the deduplicated reach over time,as an advertising campaign is adjusted, improvements can continue to bemade by altering parameters of the campaign such as, for example,consumer demographic, or time and channel of broadcast of TV content.

Calculating Incremental Reach

On day t, let the deduplicated reach (direct or sampled) be x. Theincremental reach is the additional deduplicated reach after running thecampaign. In a cross-screen environment, this is a useful parameter tocalculate if an advertiser wants be able to assess whether they canextend a 30% reach via TV to say, a 35% reach by extending to mobileplatforms. One caveat is that in direct measurement of, e.g., TV data,the portion of the sample obtained for smart-TV's is only a subset ofthe overall data, due to the relatively small number of smart-TV'scurrently in the population at large.

In the case of modeled measurement data such as is obtained from a panelwhere the nature of the sample has to be inferred, the ID of the user inthe consumer graph from whom the data was collected is not known. Hence,it is not possible to tell if the same user has viewed the advertisementin the past. Therefore the incremental deduplicated reach cannot becalculated for modeled data because devices cannot be associated withparticular users. Since the incremental reach from the sampledmeasurement, without deduplication, can be calculated, as describedabove, the methods herein are superior to panel-based methods.

First Party Audience Measurement

The consumer graph enables the calculation of the Total Reach, combinedfrom direct and sampled data, for a First Party audience segment. Thefirst party audience segment is the target audience composed ofconsumers in the graph. For example, a publisher like Truecar.com orESPN.com can provide a list of all visitors to their website. Thevisitors are mapped to nodes of the graph. Furthermore, the subset ofnodes from which sampled data can be collected can be identified. Thefollowing quantities can be calculated from the intersection ofconsumers (nodes) that are in the total and sampled dataset. The TotalFirst Party Reach is given by:Deduplicated First Party Exposed Audience=Deduplicated ExposedAudience+Deduplicated Exposed Sampled Audience−Number of advertexposures on devices common to both graph and sampled dataset.

That is, the exposed audience numbers from direct and sampledmeasurements are combined, and the devices common to the two datasetsare subtracted from the result.Deduplicated First Party Reach=Deduplicated First Party ExposedAudience/Total Audience.

Thus the consumer graph combined with direct and sampled data allowscalculation of reach and frequency against first party data, whichextends measurement beyond demographic segments (such as age, gender,and income) that measurement solutions like Nielsen and Rentraktypically provide.

It should be noted that some measures, such as GRP's, are meaningful fora general audience, but not for a targeted group. Conversely, for atargeted audience, a better measure is, for example, a TRP. Deduplicatedreach can only practically be calculated for a targeted audience.Advantageously, however, the methods herein are different from a panelapproach in which it is not possible to calculate deduplicated reach oraccurate numbers on reach.

Method for Improved Cross-Screen Measurement

The system normalizes the data by creating multi-dimensionalclassifications per consumer. Whereas other systems used in the art rollup consumer data into a single profile with one-dimensional analysis,the system herein allows for a multi-dimensional profile that maintainsa number of device classifications per consumer. For example, existingmethods of analysis will add all data of a single consumer into a singleviewership statistic such as combining together all “events involvingsocial media,” or “web searches for BMW's”, regardless of where theywere performed. By contrast, the system herein maintains deviceclassifications for each point of viewership data, and is capable oflinking data from multiple consumer devices. Thus, the computation ofpredictions maintains the device classifications as it reviews aconsumer's viewing habits. A prediction, such as the time of day aconsumer spends on their phone compared to the time spent on theirlaptop computer viewing BMW listings, can be made with greater accuracy.

The system measures the accuracy of its predictions against incomingviewership data, thereby creating a data feedback loop. The systemcalculates brand lift data (a measure of increase in brand awareness asa result of a campaign)—from survey data, and sales lift data (a measureof increase in sales due to ads) from point of sale data, (e.g., onlinepurchase data, from companies like ShopCom, KantarMedia), which it thentests against existing predictive models to determine their accuracy.The difference(s) between the predicted behaviors and the actualbehaviors is/are used to adjust the prediction algorithms, and the modeladjusts accordingly. Adjustments can be performed on aconsumer-to-consumer basis. The feedback loop adjustments can be made inreal-time, as new data is generated by consumer actions. The predictivemodel can make such statements as: “we know that advertisement reached x% of market segment A, if you take the following next steps (from apredictive model), we can predict that you will increase reach by y %.”

In addition to measuring actual behavior, the system can link consumerdata to census data. Census data is collected from vendors that conductboth online and offline surveys. Sample data from consumer behavior isoverlaid on census data to provide measurements of potential reach toconsumers. This process is designed to improve the predictive modelbecause it can gauge for anticipated changes based on changing andevolving opinions collected through census surveys.

Cross-screen analysis and models are able to determine where and when aconsumer has viewed an ad, and permit advertisers to schedule sequentialviewing of an advertising campaign, as further described in copendingU.S. application Ser. No. 15/219,264, filed Jul. 25, 2016, entitled“SEQUENTIAL DELIVERY OF ADVERTISING CONTENT ACROSS MEDIA DEVICES”.Advertisers can schedule where, when, and how an advertisement isbroadcast. They have control over retargeting (whether they show thesame advertising content more than once), or can choose to broadcast amulti-chapter advertising story. This is achieved via the feedback dataloop which informs the system when a particular consumer has viewed theadvertisement in real-time.

Cross Screen Measurement with First Party Data

The data used can be raw data, directly measured data, or modeled data,or any combination of the same.

Raw data used for measuring an audience can come from three differenttypes of sources: directly from each device, sampled from a subset ofthe audience population, or modeled to the audience population from apanel.

In the case of direct measurement, data is collected from each device onwhether the device was exposed to the advertisement. For example, in thecase of online video advertisements, tags such as provided within theVAST (Video Ad Serving Template) or VPAID (Video Player Ad-ServingInterface Definition) formats are used to collect data on whether theadvertisement was exposed in the browser or mobile device, and for howlong it was in the viewable area. The coverage of device data isuniversal, and represents an accurate sample of a population accordingto census data.

The total audience is then the number of users who belong to the targetaudience segment in the consumer graph. For example, if the targetaudience is males, aged 25 and over, who are high income earners, and2.1M such consumers are identified in the consumer graph, then:

Total Audience(Male, 25+, high income earners)=2.1 M

Exposed Audience=number of users belonging to the target audiencesegment in the consumer graph who were exposed to the advertisement

From this, the direct reach is:Reach=Exposed Audience/Total Audience

In the case of sampled measurement, data is collected from a subset ofdevices on whether the device was exposed to the advertisement. Forexample, in the case of OEM Smart TVs, Set Top Boxes, or OTT devices,data is only collected from a subset of the population that have thosespecific devices.

As shown in FIG. 5, the consumer graph is representative of thepopulation (cloud) in the target audience (all circles having a blackborder). The sampled measurement data is available from a subset of theconsumers (filled circles). The consumer graph is then used to normalizeand de-bias the data collected from the target audience segment in, forexample, the following way. The sampled audience in the target audiencesegment is:

-   -   Total Sampled Audience=number of sampled users who belong to the        target audience segment in the consumer graph.    -   Exposed Sampled Audience=number of sampled users who belong to        the target audience segment who were exposed to the advert or        media.

Then, the sampled reach isSampled Reach=Exposed Sampled Audience/Total Sampled Audience

The Sampled Audience dataset can be a biased representation of theactual population distribution. In this case, a normalizing factor isapplied to de-bias the reach calculations.

$\begin{matrix}{{{Audience}\mspace{14mu}{Normalizing}\mspace{14mu}{Factor}} = \frac{\left\lbrack {{Total}\mspace{14mu}{{Audience}/{Total}}\mspace{14mu}{Population}} \right\rbrack}{\begin{matrix}\left\lbrack {{Total}\mspace{14mu}{Sampled}\mspace{14mu}{{Audience}/}} \right. \\\left. {{Sampled}\mspace{14mu}{Population}} \right\rbrack\end{matrix}}} \\{= {\left\lbrack {{Total}\mspace{14mu}{{Audience}/{Total}}\mspace{14mu}{Sampled}\mspace{14mu}{Audience}} \right\rbrack/}} \\{\left\lbrack {{Sampled}\mspace{14mu}{{Population}/{Total}}\mspace{11mu}{Population}}\; \right\rbrack} \\{= {\left( {{Total}\mspace{14mu}{Audience} \times {Sampled}\mspace{14mu}{Population}} \right)/}} \\{\left( {{Total}\mspace{14mu}{Population} \times {Total}\mspace{14mu}{Sampled}}\mspace{14mu} \right.} \\\left. {Audience} \right)\end{matrix}$

Equivalently,Audience Normalizing Factor=Total Audience Percentage/Sampled AudiencePercentage

For example, if the percentage of Males, 25+, in the general populationis 25%, and the percentage of Males, 25+, in the sampled population is50% (i.e., they are over-represented in the sampled population by afactor of 2), then the Audience Normalizing Factor=0.25/0.50=0.50.

The sampled reach is adjusted by multiplying with the AudienceNormalizing Factor, as follows:Adjusted Sampled Reach=(Exposed Sampled Audience/Total SampledAudience)*Audience Normalizing Factor

In certain measurement datasets, like those used by Nielsen, theadvertisement exposure data is collected from an unknown panel, andrepresentative models are constructed for the population. This ismodeled data. See, e.g., http://sites.nielsen.com/totalaudience/

Cross-Screen Frequency

The frequency is the number of times the same user or device has beenexposed to a given advertisement. The consumer graph enables calculationof the number of times a consumer has been exposed to an advertisementacross all of his or her devices. Thus the cross-screen frequency isgiven by:Cross-Screen Frequency=Deduplicated Exposed Audience/Average number ofdevices for Audience

The average number of devices per consumer for the target audiencesegment can be calculated from the consumer graph. The same quantity canalso be calculated for a given individual consumer.

Redundancy: Parameters to change: audience members; inventory (TV spot,online website), time of day, region, and network. Can deduce frommeasurement that, e.g., a particular channel is not effective. Can tryto enable frequency capping. For programmatic TV can send ads to a DMA;for digital and OTT, can deliver on an individual basis.

Monitoring and Measuring Cross-Screen Advertising Content

The technology described herein permits an advertiser to targetadvertising content to a consumer across more than one media conduit,including both TV and online media, and then to quantify the progress ofthe campaign. There are two types of environment in which an advertisercan target a consumer. In a 1:1 environment, a DSP can just use theactual segment and/or a modeled out version of the actual segment, tomake a real time decision to place the advert if the consumer matchesthe targeting parameters. In an index approach, when it is not possibleto target 1:1 and it is not possible to do dynamic advert insertion orreal time decisioning, the system instead looks at concentration ofviewers projected to access the slot (such as a TV program or VODprogram) and then targets the slots that have the highest concentrationof the target consumers.

In a preferred embodiment, the advertiser has control over theallocation of the advertising content because the advertiser accessesthe system via a unified interface that presents information aboutinventory, manages bids on the inventory, and provides a list ofpotential advertising targets consistent with a campaign description andthe advertiser's budget. The system then communicates with, for example,supply-side providers to ensure that the desired slots are purchased,typically via a bidding process, and the advertising content isdelivered or caused to be delivered.

In one embodiment, the technology provides for an advertising campaignthat involves delivery of content across two or more media conduits,rather than delivery of a single advertisement to multiple consumers atdifferent times on, say, TV only. The system thereby permits delivery ofadvertising content to a given consumer, or a population of consumers,on more than one device. For example, a consumer may view a portion ofthe campaign on a TV, and may also see the campaign within a desktopbrowser session on their laptop or on their OTT device. In this context,the TV inventory can be purchased across a variety of TV consumptiondevices that include, but are not limited to linear, time-shifted,traditional and programmatic TV, according to bid methodology describedherein or familiar to those skilled in the art. In some instances, theadvertiser desires to cap the number of impressions that a givenconsumer receives; in other instances, the advertiser wants to extendthe campaign from one media to another based on metrics calculatedacross various media conduits. The method permits the advertiser totarget segments of a population more precisely than before, as well asmeasure at a fine scale the success of a campaign based on performanceindicators from more than one conduit.

Computational Implementation

The computer functions for manipulations of advertising campaign data,advertising inventory, and consumer and device graphs, inrepresentations such as bit-strings, can be developed by a programmer ora team of programmers skilled in the art. The functions can beimplemented in a number and variety of programming languages, including,in some cases mixed implementations. For example, the functions as wellas scripting functions can be programmed in functional programminglanguages such as: Scala, Golang, and R. Other programming languages maybe used for portions of the implementation, such as Prolog, Pascal, C,C++, Java, Python, VisualBasic, Perl, .Net languages such as C#, andother equivalent languages not listed herein. The capability of thetechnology is not limited by or dependent on the underlying programminglanguage used for implementation or control of access to the basicfunctions. Alternatively, the functionality could be implemented fromhigher level functions such as tool-kits that rely on previouslydeveloped functions for manipulating mathematical expressions such asbit-strings and sparse vectors.

The technology herein can be developed to run with any of the well-knowncomputer operating systems in use today, as well as others, not listedherein. Those operating systems include, but are not limited to: Windows(including variants such as Windows XP, Windows95, Windows2000, WindowsVista, Windows 7, and Windows 8, Windows Mobile, and Windows 10, andintermediate updates thereof, available from Microsoft Corporation);Apple iOS (including variants such as iOS3, iOS4, and iOS5, iOS6, iOS7,iOS8, and iOS9, and intervening updates to the same); Apple Macoperating systems such as OS9, OS 10.x (including variants known as“Leopard”, “Snow Leopard”, “Mountain Lion”, and “Lion”; the UNIXoperating system (e.g., Berkeley Standard version); and the Linuxoperating system (e.g., available from numerous distributors of free or“open source” software).

To the extent that a given implementation relies on other softwarecomponents, already implemented, such as functions for manipulatingsparse vectors, and functions for calculating similarity metrics ofvectors, those functions can be assumed to be accessible to a programmerof skill in the art.

Furthermore, it is to be understood that the executable instructionsthat cause a suitably-programmed computer to execute the methodsdescribed herein, can be stored and delivered in any suitablecomputer-readable format. This can include, but is not limited to, aportable readable drive, such as a large capacity “hard-drive”, or a“pen-drive”, such as connects to a computer's USB port, an internaldrive to a computer, and a CD-Rom or an optical disk. It is further tobe understood that while the executable instructions can be stored on aportable computer-readable medium and delivered in such tangible form toa purchaser or user, the executable instructions can also be downloadedfrom a remote location to the user's computer, such as via an Internetconnection which itself may rely in part on a wireless technology suchas WiFi. Such an aspect of the technology does not imply that theexecutable instructions take the form of a signal or other non-tangibleembodiment. The executable instructions may also be executed as part ofa “virtual machine” implementation.

The technology herein is not limited to a particular web browser versionor type; it can be envisaged that the technology can be practiced withone or more of: Safari, Internet Explorer, Edge, FireFox, Chrome, orOpera, and any version thereof.

Computing Apparatus

An exemplary general-purpose computing apparatus 900 suitable forpracticing the methods described herein is depicted schematically inFIG. 6.

The computer system 900 comprises at least one data processing unit(CPU) 922, a memory 938, which will typically include both high speedrandom access memory as well as non-volatile memory (such as one or moremagnetic disk drives), a user interface 924, one more disks 934, and atleast one network or other communication interface connection 936 forcommunicating with other computers over a network, including theInternet, as well as other devices, such as via a high speed networkingcable, or a wireless connection. There may optionally be a firewall 952between the computer and the Internet. At least the CPU 922, memory 938,user interface 924, disk 934 and network interface 936, communicate withone another via at least one communication bus 933.

CPU 922 may optionally include a vector processor, optimized formanipulating large vectors of data.

Memory 938 stores procedures and data, typically including some or allof: an operating system 940 for providing basic system services; one ormore application programs, such as a parser routine 950, and a compiler(not shown in FIG. 6), a file system 942, one or more databases 944 thatstore advertising inventory 946, campaign descriptions 948, and otherinformation, and optionally a floating point coprocessor where necessaryfor carrying out high level mathematical operations. The methods of thepresent invention may also draw upon functions contained in one or moredynamically linked libraries, not shown in FIG. 6, but stored either inmemory 938, or on disk 934.

The database and other routines shown in FIG. 6 as stored in memory 938may instead, optionally, be stored on disk 934 where the amount of datain the database is too great to be efficiently stored in memory 938. Thedatabase may also instead, or in part, be stored on one or more remotecomputers that communicate with computer system 900 through networkinterface 936.

Memory 938 is encoded with instructions for receiving input from one ormore advertisers and for calculating a similarity score for consumersagainst one another. Instructions further include programmedinstructions for performing one or more of parsing, calculating ametric, and various statistical analyses. In some embodiments, thesparse vector themselves are not calculated on the computer 900 but areperformed on a different computer and, e.g., transferred via networkinterface 936 to computer 900.

Various implementations of the technology herein can be contemplated,particularly as performed on computing apparatuses of varyingcomplexity, including, without limitation, workstations, PC's, laptops,notebooks, tablets, netbooks, and other mobile computing devices,including cell-phones, mobile phones, wearable devices, and personaldigital assistants. The computing devices can have suitably configuredprocessors, including, without limitation, graphics processors, vectorprocessors, and math coprocessors, for running software that carries outthe methods herein. In addition, certain computing functions aretypically distributed across more than one computer so that, forexample, one computer accepts input and instructions, and a second oradditional computers receive the instructions via a network connectionand carry out the processing at a remote location, and optionallycommunicate results or output back to the first computer.

Control of the computing apparatuses can be via a user interface 924,which may comprise a display, mouse 926, keyboard 930, and/or otheritems not shown in FIG. 6, such as a track-pad, track-ball,touch-screen, stylus, speech-recognition, gesture-recognitiontechnology, or other input such as based on a user's eye-movement, orany subcombination or combination of inputs thereof. Additionally,implementations are configured that permit a purchaser of advertisinginventory to access computer 900 remotely, over a network connection,and to view inventory via an interface having attributes comparable tointerface 924.

In one embodiment, the computing apparatus can be configured to restrictuser access, such as by scanning a QR-code, gesture recognition,biometric data input, or password input.

The manner of operation of the technology, when reduced to an embodimentas one or more software modules, functions, or subroutines, can be in abatch-mode—as on a stored database of inventory and consumer data,processed in batches, or by interaction with a user who inputs specificinstructions for a single advertising campaign.

The results of matching advertising inventory to criteria for anadvertising campaign, as created by the technology herein, can bedisplayed in tangible form, such as on one or more computer displays,such as a monitor, laptop display, or the screen of a tablet, notebook,netbook, or cellular phone. The results can further be printed to paperform, stored as electronic files in a format for saving on acomputer-readable medium or for transferring or sharing betweencomputers, or projected onto a screen of an auditorium such as during apresentation.

ToolKit: The technology herein can be implemented in a manner that givesa user (such as a purchaser of advertising inventory) access to, andcontrol over, basic functions that provide key elements of advertisingcampaign management. Certain default settings can be built in to acomputer-implementation, but the user can be given as much choice aspossible over the features that are used in assigning inventory, therebypermitting a user to remove certain features from consideration oradjust their weightings, as applicable.

The toolkit can be operated via scripting tools, as well as or insteadof a graphical user interface that offers touch-screen selection, and/ormenu pull-downs, as applicable to the sophistication of the user. Themanner of access to the underlying tools by a user is not in any way alimitation on the technology's novelty, inventiveness, or utility.

Accordingly, the methods herein may be implemented on or across one ormore computing apparatuses having processors configured to execute themethods, and encoded as executable instructions in computer readablemedia.

For example, the technology herein includes computer readable mediaencoded with instructions for executing a method for quantifyingefficacy of an advertising campaign, the instructions comprisinginstructions for identifying a target audience based on one or moredemographic factors; for a consumer in the target audience, instructionsfor identifying two or more display devices accessible to the consumer,wherein the two or more display devices comprise at least one TV and atleast one mobile device, and instructions for utilizing a device graphconstructed from an aggregation of TV viewing data and online behavioraldata for the consumer; instructions for monitoring delivery of two ormore items of advertising content to the consumers in the targetaudience, wherein the two or more items of advertising content comprisevideo content and are scheduled for delivery on the two or more devices;receiving a confirmation of whether each of the consumers viewed each ofthe first and second items of advertising content; and utilizing theconfirmation in calculation of a deduplicated reach for the advertisingcampaign.

The technology herein may further comprise computer-readable mediaencoded with instructions for executing a method for reducing redundancyof delivery of advertising content, the instructions comprisinginstructions for identifying a target audience based on one or moredemographic factors, wherein the target audience comprises consumers towhom an advertising campaign is directed; for a consumer in the targetaudience, instructions for identifying two or more display devicesaccessible to the consumer, wherein the two or more display devicescomprise at least one TV and at least one mobile device, and wherein theidentifying utilizes a device graph constructed from an aggregation ofTV viewing data and online behavioral data for the consumer;instructions for monitoring delivery of two or more items of advertisingcontent to the consumers in the target audience, wherein the two or moreitems of advertising content comprise video content and are scheduledfor delivery on the two or more devices; instructions for receiving aconfirmation of whether each of the consumers viewed each of the firstand second items of advertising content; and if a consumer viewed boththe first and second items of advertising content, instructions foradjusting one or more parameters of the advertising campaign, in orderto reduce redundancy of delivery of advertising content to one or moreof the consumers during subsequent trials of the campaign.

Correspondingly, the technology herein also includes computing apparatushaving at least one processor configured to execute instructions forimplementing a method for quantifying efficacy of an advertisingcampaign, the instructions comprising instructions for identifying atarget audience based on one or more demographic factors; for a consumerin the target audience, instructions for identifying two or more displaydevices accessible to the consumer, wherein the two or more displaydevices comprise at least one TV and at least one mobile device, andinstructions for utilizing a device graph constructed from anaggregation of TV viewing data and online behavioral data for theconsumer; instructions for monitoring delivery of two or more items ofadvertising content to the consumers in the target audience, wherein thetwo or more items of advertising content comprise video content and arescheduled for delivery on the two or more devices; receiving aconfirmation of whether each of the consumers viewed each of the firstand second items of advertising content; and utilizing the confirmationin calculation of a deduplicated reach for the advertising campaign.

Furthermore, the technology herein may further include a computingapparatus having at least one processor configured to executeinstructions for implementing a method for reducing redundancy ofdelivery of advertising content, the instructions comprisinginstructions for identifying a target audience based on one or moredemographic factors, wherein the target audience comprises consumers towhom an advertising campaign is directed; for a consumer in the targetaudience, instructions for identifying two or more display devicesaccessible to the consumer, wherein the two or more display devicescomprise at least one TV and at least one mobile device, and wherein theidentifying utilizes a device graph constructed from an aggregation ofTV viewing data and online behavioral data for the consumer;instructions for monitoring delivery of two or more items of advertisingcontent to the consumers in the target audience, wherein the two or moreitems of advertising content comprise video content and are scheduledfor delivery on the two or more devices; instructions for receiving aconfirmation of whether each of the consumers viewed each of the firstand second items of advertising content; and if a consumer viewed boththe first and second items of advertising content, instructions foradjusting one or more parameters of the advertising campaign, in orderto reduce redundancy of delivery of advertising content to one or moreof the consumers during subsequent trials of the campaign.

Cloud Computing

The methods herein can be implemented to run in the “cloud.” Thus theprocesses that one or more computer processors execute to carry out thecomputer-based methods herein do not need to be carried out by a singlecomputing machine or apparatus. Processes and calculations can bedistributed amongst multiple processors in one or more datacenters thatare physically situated in different locations from one another. Data isexchanged with the various processors using network connections such asthe Internet. Preferably, security protocols such as encryption areutilized to minimize the possibility that consumer data can becompromised. Calculations that are performed across one or morelocations remote from an entity such as a DSP include calculation ofconsumer and device graphs, and updates to the same.

EXAMPLES Example 1: Implementation

An implementation has been accomplished, employing apparatus andprocesses as described elsewhere herein. In such an implementation, aunified interface is provided by which an advertiser has control overthe allocation of the advertising content because the advertiseraccesses the system via the interface that presents information aboutinventory, manages bids on the inventory, and provides a list ofpotential advertising targets consistent with a campaign description andthe advertiser's budget, as well as provides feedback and metrics on thesuccess of its campaign.

The foregoing description is intended to illustrate various aspects ofthe instant technology. It is not intended that the examples presentedherein limit the scope of the appended claims. The invention now beingfully described, it will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the artthat many changes and modifications can be made thereto withoutdeparting from the spirit or scope of the appended claims.

What is claimed:
 1. A method for quantifying efficacy of an advertisingcampaign, the method comprising: identifying a target audience based onone or more demographic factors; identifying a set of devices, eachdevice in the set of devices having a respective set of attributes;identifying, in the set of devices, two or more display devices thateach have a similar respective set of attributes; creating a node toinclude the two or more display devices; inferring from the node thatthe two or more display devices belong to a consumer that is in thetarget audience based on the two or more display devices having similarbehavior at different times; associating the two or more display deviceswith the consumer; for the consumer in the target audience, identifyingthe two or more display devices accessible to the consumer, wherein thetwo or more display devices comprise at least one TV and at least onemobile device; monitoring delivery of advertising content to theconsumer in the target audience, wherein the advertising contentcomprises video content that is scheduled for delivery on the two ormore display devices associated with the consumer; inferring whether theconsumer viewed the advertising content based on identifying the atleast one TV and at least one mobile device in a device graph anddetermining that the at least one TV and at least one mobile deviceplayed at least a portion of a show that is associated with a broadcastof the advertising content; and using the inference in calculation of adeduplicated reach for the advertising campaign, wherein the calculationof the deduplicated reach includes determining a likelihood indicativeof whether the consumer saw the same advertising content on more thanone device, wherein the calculation of the deduplicated reach for theadvertising campaign excludes at least one instance of the consumerlikely seeing the advertising content.
 2. The method of claim 1, whereinbehavioral data is obtained from a method selected from: deep learning,machine learning, and Bayesian methods.
 3. The method of claim 1,wherein behavioral data comprises first party and third party data. 4.The method of claim 1, further comprising aggregating behaviors from thetwo or more display devices of the node are aggregated to a set of nodeattributes for the node.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein inferringfrom the node that the two or more display devices belong to theconsumer that is in the target audience based on the two or more displaydevices having similar behavior at different times includes determininga probability that the two or more display devices belong to theconsumer, wherein the two or more display devices are associated withthe consumer when the probability that the two or more display devicesbelong to the consumer is above a threshold probability.
 6. A method ofreducing redundancy of delivery of advertising content, the methodcomprising: identifying a target audience based on one or moredemographic factors, wherein the target audience comprises consumers towhom an advertising campaign is directed; identifying a set of devices,each device in the set of devices having a respective set of attributes;identifying, in the set of devices, two or more display devices thateach have a similar respective set of attributes; creating a node toinclude the two or more display devices; inferring from the node thatthe two or more display devices belong to a consumer that is in thetarget audience based on the two or more display devices having similarbehavior at different times; associating the two or more display deviceswith the consumer; for the consumer in the target audience, identifyingthe two or more display devices accessible to the consumer, wherein thetwo or more display devices comprise at least one TV and at least onemobile device; monitoring delivery of advertising content to theconsumer in the target audience, wherein the advertising contentcomprises video content that is scheduled for delivery on the two ormore display devices associated with the consumer; inferring whether theconsumer viewed the advertising content based on identifying the atleast one TV and at least one mobile device in a device graph anddetermining that the at least one TV and at least one mobile deviceplayed at least a portion of a show that is associated with a broadcastof the advertising content; and if it is inferred that the consumerviewed both a first item of advertising content and a second item ofadvertising content, adjusting one or more parameters of the advertisingcampaign in order to reduce redundancy of delivery of the advertisingcontent to the consumer during subsequent trials of the campaign,wherein the parameters are selected from one or more of: demographicfactors of the target audience; sources of advertising inventory; timeof day of delivery; and region of delivery.
 7. The method of claim 6,wherein the sources of advertising inventory include: TV channel, onlinewebsite, and video-on-demand.
 8. The method of claim 6, wherein theadjusting one or more parameters of the advertising campaign includesstopping scheduling of the advertising content online to the consumer.9. The method of claim 6, wherein behavioral data is obtained from amethod selected from: deep learning, machine learning, and Bayesianmethods.
 10. The method of claim 6, wherein behavioral data comprisesfirst party and third party data.
 11. The method of claim 6, whereinidentifying the target audience comprises identifying consumers thathave at least a threshold similarity to each other.
 12. The method ofclaim 6, further comprising aggregating behaviors from the two or moredisplay devices of the node are aggregated to a set of node attributesfor the node.
 13. The method of claim 6, wherein inferring from the nodethat the two or more display devices belong to the consumer that is inthe target audience based on the two or more display devices havingsimilar behavior at different times includes determining a probabilitythat the two or more display devices belong to the consumer, wherein thetwo or more display devices are associated with the consumer when theprobability that the two or more display devices belong to the consumeris above a threshold probability.
 14. A non-transitory computer-readablestorage device having embedded therein a set of instructions which, whenexecuted by one or more processors of a computer, causes the computer toexecute operations comprising: identifying a target audience based onone or more demographic factors; identifying a set of devices, eachdevice in the set of devices having a respective set of attributes;identifying, in the set of devices, two or more display devices thateach have a similar respective set of attributes; creating a node toinclude the two or more display devices; inferring from the node thatthe two or more display devices belong to a consumer that is in thetarget audience based on the two or more display devices having similarbehavior at different times; associating the two or more display deviceswith the consumer; for the consumer in the target audience, identifyingthe two or more display devices accessible to the consumer, wherein thetwo or more display devices comprise at least one TV and at least onemobile device; monitoring delivery of advertising content to theconsumer in the target audience, wherein the advertising contentcomprises video content that is scheduled for delivery on the two ormore display devices associated with the consumer; inferring whether theconsumer viewed the advertising content based on identifying the atleast one TV and at least one mobile device in a device graph anddetermining that the at least one TV and at least one mobile deviceplayed at least a portion of a show that is associated with a broadcastof the advertising content; and using the inference in calculation of adeduplicated reach for an advertising campaign, wherein the calculationof the deduplicated reach includes determining a likelihood indicativeof whether the consumer saw the same advertising content on more thanone device, wherein the calculation of the deduplicated reach for theadvertising campaign excludes at least one instance of the consumerlikely seeing the advertising content.
 15. The non-transitorycomputer-readable storage device of claim 14 the operations furthercomprising aggregating behaviors from the two or more display devices ofthe node are aggregated to a set of node attributes for the node. 16.The non-transitory computer-readable storage device of claim 14, whereininferring from the node that the two or more display devices belong tothe consumer that is in the target audience based on the two or moredisplay devices having similar behavior at different times includesdetermining a probability that the two or more display devices belong tothe consumer, wherein the two or more display devices are associatedwith the consumer when the probability that the two or more displaydevices belong to the consumer is above a threshold probability.
 17. Thenon-transitory computer-readable storage device of claim 14, whereinbehavioral data is obtained from a method selected from: deep learning,machine learning, and Bayesian methods.
 18. The non-transitorycomputer-readable storage device of claim 14, wherein behavioral datacomprises first party and third party data.
 19. The non-transitorycomputer-readable storage device of claim 14, identifying the targetaudience comprises identifying consumers that have at least a thresholdsimilarity to each other.